The administration of pre-trial detention center-4 in Moscow transferred pensioner Konstantin Seleznev, accused of distributing military “fakes” (clause “d”, part 2 of article 207.3 of the Criminal Code), to an overcrowded cell. Human rights activist Alexandra Popova, the wife of Artem Kamardin, a defendant in the Mayakovsky case , reported this to OVD-Info.
According to Popova, Seleznev was placed in a cell with 22 beds. But there are not 22 prisoners in the cell, but “about 30.” They have to take turns sleeping.
In November last year, Seleznev reported about the pressure on him in pre-trial detention center-4. He was kept in a smoke-filled cell with four people with criminal records, who, according to the law, must be kept separately, since Seleznev was brought to criminal responsibility for the first time.
According to the pensioner’s wife, one of the cellmates insulted her husband and “made his life worse.” The man was also not taken out for a walk for a week. Five days later, Konstantin Seleznev was transferred to another cell.
The man was sent to a pre-trial detention center on October 4, 2023, and the day before his home was searched. Security forces confiscated his equipment and passport.
Initially, the pensioner was charged with two posts on his VKontakte page. In one of them, he copied his own letter to the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation, in which he spoke about the UN report “on the crimes of Russian military personnel in three regions of Ukraine.” In the text, the man also cited an investigation by The New York Times journalists about the killings of civilians in Bucha.
Seleznev titled the second publication with the words “Letter to Putin as the leader of a terrorist state.” In this post, the man criticized the President of the Russian Federation for assigning an honorary name to the 53rd anti-aircraft brigade. The investigation into the case was completed in May. The post about the brigade was excluded from the final accusation.
In August, Judge Albina Galimova of the Lefortovo District Court of Moscow closed the trial in Seleznev’s case at the request of the investigation, citing the presence of a “secret protected by law” in the case. Seleznev's lawyer Oscar Cherdzhiev said that he does not know what kind of secret we are talking about. In addition, neither he nor his client signed a non-disclosure agreement.
- Since February 24, 2022—the first day of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine—residents of Russian cities have been holding anti-war protests every day and talking about the tragedy online. Anti-war speeches and statements become grounds for criminal prosecution. At the moment, more than 1,100 people have become defendants in criminal cases initiated due to protest against the war with Ukraine. Read more about this in our infographic .
- Article 207.3 (Public dissemination of knowingly false information about the use of the armed forces of the Russian Federation) was included in the Criminal Code in March 2022 - in this way the authorities responded to anti-war speeches and statements, as well as the dissemination of information about the war that does not come from official Russian sources. The maximum penalty under this article is 15 years in prison.